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Wednesday, March 13, 2013

House Tour - Part 3

Ok, so you've seen the first floor and the second floor of our house. Now it's time to see the last part, the basement and the yard.

The basement was fully finished at one point, but as of right now, it is no longer. We purchased the house with knowledge that there were some mold issues in the basement because of a previous water issue, so we've had to do some work down there to get rid of the mold. The basement was high priority on our list when we first purchased the house, but it's kind of taken a back burner now.

But, here we go! Like I did with the rest of the house, here is a floor plan of the basement. I didn't have Microsoft Visio with me at the time, so I used Microsoft Word and made a legend at the bottom that explains what each thing is.

When you walk down the stairs to the basement from the hallway on the first floor, you come down into the open space in the basement. The area is really, really big, measuring at just about 700 square feet! There is an area closer to the utility room and there is also an area where there is a door that leads up a steep flight of stairs to the backyard.

Behind the stairs that go up to the main floor, there is a closet, which is really oddly shaped, but has a bookshelf in it, in addition to the deeper storage space that actually runs underneath the staircase.

Please ignore the previous owner's belongings...

You can see in the floor plan above that there is actually a bedroom down here too. The bedroom is a really good size, and just to give you an idea of it's placement, it is directly underneath the bigger bedroom on the first floor of the house. The bedroom even has a small walk-in closet, but the doors are currently removed for mold remediation. When the time comes, I'll paint them white to match the rest of the moulding and then hang them back up.

If we had turned left after coming down the stairs from the first floor, we would have walked into the full bathroom and the laundry room. The bathroom is kind of dated and is really builder-standard, but it's in the basement, so it's not seen that often, especially since we currently aren't using it as entertainment space. The bathroom has a toilet, a sink, and a stand-up shower stall. It needed some serious cleaning in the pictures below, but that has since been taken care of by a professional cleaning company. It was that bad...

Through the doorway next to the shower stall is the laundry room, which is actually a really good size. There is a folding table and a space for the washer and dryer. There are no appliances in the pictures below, but you can see in the floor plan above where they are currently located. Eventually, we'd like to change the water line and electrical for the washer and dryer and get them closer to each other, but that's not absolutely necessary right now, so we're living with the current layout.

And that's it for the basement. So, we'll move onto the back yard. While the property is small, at just about 1/4 acre, it's the perfect size for us without being too much work. The backyard is so cute though.

First, the door from the basement looks like this. Please keep in mind that the house has been completely repainted now, and that these pictures are from before we closed on the property.

To the right of this picture is the small yard part of the backyard. The yard is completely fenced in, and has great arborvitaes along most of the fence for added privacy.

You can tell from the last picture that I was standing on the deck, so now I'll show you what that looks like. The deck is really cute. It's not that high off the ground, which I like, and it has a built-in bench that goes around on two sides for additional seating. I think for safety's sake, we're going to build a back for the bench, and then I'll make some outdoor cushions for comfort.

Now that the house is painted, we also have plans to paint the deck, as the two different shades of gray don't go together very well, and we want to brighten up the space a little bit.

When standing on the deck and looking straight ahead into the yard, we have a non-fruit producing pear tree, which is absolutely gorgeous. This picture also shows two of the three additional Poplar trees growing along the fence, but we had all three of them removed because not only were they breaking the fence, but they were so tall and hanging over our back-neighbor's house, and we didn't want that liability.

I can't wait to see this pear tree in bloom this Spring!

I know that I have shown you some pictures of the front of the house before, but these show off a bit more of the landscaping, which will all likely be changed in the Spring. There are a lot of shrubs right along the house and not only are they not very attractive, but they also are too close to the siding and are causing problems, so we'll be taking care of that soon too.

Some of these pictures were also taken before the house was painted and the roof was replaced, so please keep that in mind.

This next picture is of the kitchen addition and front porch by the driveway. You can really see how overgrown the bushes and shrubs are along this part of the house.

This next picture is of the corner of the original part of the house and the addition. Again, needs weeding badly, and some grooming overall.

I know that the stone on the house looks very brown, but it's not actually that brown. When you look closer, there is a lot of gray, and some dark purples too, which is why we decided to go with a darker gray paint color for the wood siding. I actually really love the stone facade.

And now for the front of the house. This first picture is before the painting and roof were done.

Before...No paint or roof.

During.... Painting done, roofing not.

After...Painting and roof done!

This concludes our house tour! What do you think? I am so glad that we decided to get the house painted and the roof redone. It makes it look so much better right off the bat. Now for all the other projects that we want to accomplish! The list never ends when you're a homeowner, right?!

Ok, so you've seen the first floor and the second floor of our house. Now it's time to see the last part, the basement and the yard.

The basement was fully finished at one point, but as of right now, it is no longer. We purchased the house with knowledge that there were some mold issues in the basement because of a previous water issue, so we've had to do some work down there to get rid of the mold. The basement was high priority on our list when we first purchased the house, but it's kind of taken a back burner now.

But, here we go! Like I did with the rest of the house, here is a floor plan of the basement. I didn't have Microsoft Visio with me at the time, so I used Microsoft Word and made a legend at the bottom that explains what each thing is.

When you walk down the stairs to the basement from the hallway on the first floor, you come down into the open space in the basement. The area is really, really big, measuring at just about 700 square feet! There is an area closer to the utility room and there is also an area where there is a door that leads up a steep flight of stairs to the backyard.

Behind the stairs that go up to the main floor, there is a closet, which is really oddly shaped, but has a bookshelf in it, in addition to the deeper storage space that actually runs underneath the staircase.

Please ignore the previous owner's belongings...

You can see in the floor plan above that there is actually a bedroom down here too. The bedroom is a really good size, and just to give you an idea of it's placement, it is directly underneath the bigger bedroom on the first floor of the house. The bedroom even has a small walk-in closet, but the doors are currently removed for mold remediation. When the time comes, I'll paint them white to match the rest of the moulding and then hang them back up.

If we had turned left after coming down the stairs from the first floor, we would have walked into the full bathroom and the laundry room. The bathroom is kind of dated and is really builder-standard, but it's in the basement, so it's not seen that often, especially since we currently aren't using it as entertainment space. The bathroom has a toilet, a sink, and a stand-up shower stall. It needed some serious cleaning in the pictures below, but that has since been taken care of by a professional cleaning company. It was that bad...

Through the doorway next to the shower stall is the laundry room, which is actually a really good size. There is a folding table and a space for the washer and dryer. There are no appliances in the pictures below, but you can see in the floor plan above where they are currently located. Eventually, we'd like to change the water line and electrical for the washer and dryer and get them closer to each other, but that's not absolutely necessary right now, so we're living with the current layout.

And that's it for the basement. So, we'll move onto the back yard. While the property is small, at just about 1/4 acre, it's the perfect size for us without being too much work. The backyard is so cute though.

First, the door from the basement looks like this. Please keep in mind that the house has been completely repainted now, and that these pictures are from before we closed on the property.

To the right of this picture is the small yard part of the backyard. The yard is completely fenced in, and has great arborvitaes along most of the fence for added privacy.

You can tell from the last picture that I was standing on the deck, so now I'll show you what that looks like. The deck is really cute. It's not that high off the ground, which I like, and it has a built-in bench that goes around on two sides for additional seating. I think for safety's sake, we're going to build a back for the bench, and then I'll make some outdoor cushions for comfort.

Now that the house is painted, we also have plans to paint the deck, as the two different shades of gray don't go together very well, and we want to brighten up the space a little bit.

When standing on the deck and looking straight ahead into the yard, we have a non-fruit producing pear tree, which is absolutely gorgeous. This picture also shows two of the three additional Poplar trees growing along the fence, but we had all three of them removed because not only were they breaking the fence, but they were so tall and hanging over our back-neighbor's house, and we didn't want that liability.

I can't wait to see this pear tree in bloom this Spring!

I know that I have shown you some pictures of the front of the house before, but these show off a bit more of the landscaping, which will all likely be changed in the Spring. There are a lot of shrubs right along the house and not only are they not very attractive, but they also are too close to the siding and are causing problems, so we'll be taking care of that soon too.

Some of these pictures were also taken before the house was painted and the roof was replaced, so please keep that in mind.

This next picture is of the kitchen addition and front porch by the driveway. You can really see how overgrown the bushes and shrubs are along this part of the house.

This next picture is of the corner of the original part of the house and the addition. Again, needs weeding badly, and some grooming overall.

I know that the stone on the house looks very brown, but it's not actually that brown. When you look closer, there is a lot of gray, and some dark purples too, which is why we decided to go with a darker gray paint color for the wood siding. I actually really love the stone facade.

And now for the front of the house. This first picture is before the painting and roof were done.

Before...No paint or roof.

During.... Painting done, roofing not.

After...Painting and roof done!

This concludes our house tour! What do you think? I am so glad that we decided to get the house painted and the roof redone. It makes it look so much better right off the bat. Now for all the other projects that we want to accomplish! The list never ends when you're a homeowner, right?!